Related papers: The flatness of the Universe is robust
A smooth unclustered dark matter component with negative presure could reconcile a flat universe with the many observations that find a density in ordinary, clustered matter well below the critical density and also explain the recent high…
We consider a cosmogony with a dark matter component consisting of a network of frustrated domain walls. Such a network provides a solid dark matter component with $p=-(2/3)\rho $ that remains unclustered on small scales and with…
We present the results of a high-statistics Monte Carlo simulation of a phantom crystalline (fixed-connectivity) membrane with free boundary. We verify the existence of a flat phase by examining lattices of size up to $128^2$. The…
Astrophysical tests of the stability of Nature's fundamental couplings are a key probe of the standard paradigms in fundamental physics and cosmology. In this report we discuss updated constraints on the stability of the fine-structure…
The Cosmological Principle states that the universe is both homogeneous and isotropic. This, alone, is not enough to specify the global geometry of the spacetime. If we were able to measure both the Hubble constant and the energy density we…
We compare and combine likelihood functions of the cosmological parameters Omega_m, h and sigma_8 from the CMB, type Ia supernovae and from probes of large scale structure. We include the recent results from the CMB experiments BOOMERANG…
Modern astronomical observations in cosmology provide increasingly strong evidence that the expansion of the Universe is accelerating. Explanations of the cosmic acceleration within the framework of general relativity use the hypothesis…
Several recent observations using standard rulers and standard candles now suggest, either individually or in combination, that the Universe is close to flat, i.e. that the curvature radius is about as large as the horizon radius (\sim…
Observational tests for the homogeneity of the Universe on large scales are reviewed. Assuming the Cosmological Principle we then estimate cosmological parameters by joint analysis of the Cosmic Microwave Background, Supernovae Ia, peculiar…
By following the general guiding principle that nothing should be prescribed or imposed on the universal entity, spacetime, we establish that it is the homogeneity (by which we mean homogeneity and isotropy of space and homogeneity of time)…
The case grows ever stronger that the average density of matter, ordinary and dark, is less than the critical density required for a flat universe. However, most of determinations of the mass density have been dynamical, hence sensitive…
The observational evidence for the recent acceleration of the universe demonstrates that canonical theories of cosmology and particle physics are incomplete---if not incorrect---and that new physics is out there, waiting to be discovered. A…
Five-dimensional cosmological models with two 3-branes and with a buck cosmological constant are studied. It is found that for all the three cases ($\Lambda =0$, $\Lambda >0$, and $\Lambda <0$), the conventional space-time singularity ``big…
A new model of the observed universe, using solutions to the full Einstein equations, is developed from the hypothesis that our observable universe is an underdense bubble, with an internally inhomogeneous fractal bubble distribution of…
The flatness and cosmological constant problems are solved with varying speed of light c, gravitational coupling strength G and cosmological parameter Lambda, by explicitly assuming energy conservation of observed matter. The present…
Observations conducted over the last few decades show that the expansion of the Universe is accelerating. In the standard model of cosmology, this accelerated expansion is attributed to a dark energy in the form of a cosmological constant.…
For variable gravity models the strength of gravity, as measured by Newton's ``constant'' or the Planck mass, depends on the value of a scalar field, the cosmon. We discuss two simple four-parameter models with a quadratic or constant…
A period of slow contraction with equation of state w > 1, known as an ekpyrotic phase, has been shown to flatten and smooth the universe if it begins the phase with small perturbations. In this paper, we explore how robust and powerful the…
Combining cosmological probes has consolidated the standard cosmological model with percent precision, but some tensions have recently emerged when certain parameters are estimated from the local or primordial Universe. The origin of this…
Modern observations based on general relativity indicate that the spatial geometry of the expanding, large-scale Universe is very nearly Euclidean. This basic empirical fact is at the core of the so-called "flatness problem", which is…